Pineapple slitting and conveying

ABSTRACT

Precored pineapples are contour peeled in a row of contour peeling heads. The precored and peeled pineapples from each peeling head are transferred to a downwardly inclined slide rod having a depending slitter knife and a slit guide flange for slitting and guiding the lower side of the fruit. The partially slit pineapples slide down the guide rod and pass beneath an upper slitter which completes the halving operation. The halved pineapples progress on the chutes that are progressively twisted from a vertical plane at the second slitter to a horizontal plane while the chutes gradually diverge. A juice trough is suspended from the lower edge of the slit guide flange and flexible flaps at the second slitter assist in retaining the pineapples on the twisted chutes.

United States Patent [191 Vadas 1 Sept. 25, 1973 PINEAPPLE SLITTlNG AND CONVEYING [75] Inventor: Leslie Vadas, Los Gatos, Calif.

[73] Assignee: Castle & Cooke, Inc., Honolulu,

Hawaii 22 Filed: Mar. 9, 1972 211 App]. No.: 233,130

[56]- References Cited UNITED STATES PATENTS 1,329,755 2/1920 Dunkley 83/9 3,373,784 3/1968 Holbrook 99/537 X Primary ExaminerWillie G. Abercrombie Att0rneyF. W. Anderson et a1.

[57] ABSTRACT Precored pineapples are contour peeled in a row of contour peeling heads. The precored and peeled pineapples from each peeling head are transferred to a downwardly inclined slide rod having a depending slitter knife and a slit guide flange for slitting and guiding the lower side of the fruit. The partially slit pineapples slide down the guide rod and pass beneath an upper slitter which completes the halving operation. The halved pineapples progress on the chutes that are progressively twisted from a vertical plane at the second slitter to a horizontal plane while the chutes gradually diverge. A juice trough is suspended from the lower edge of the slit guide flange and flexible flaps at the second slitter assist in retaining the pineapples on the twisted chutes.

8 Claims, 21 Drawing Figures PINEAPPLE SLITTING' AND CONVEYING REFERENCE TO RELATED APPLICATIONS The U.S. application of Vadas Ser. No. 855,520, filed Sept. 5, 1969 and assigned to Castle & Cook, now U.S. Pat. No. 3,656,529 is directed to cutting the pineapples into halves in one operation, guiding the individual halves by their core holes and gradually twisting the guides until they form generally horizontal guide surfaces.

Mechanism for delivering the pineapples in lanes to a row of contour peeling heads forms the subject matter of U.S. application to Vadas, Ser. No. 54,528, filed July 28, 1970 and also assigned to Castle & Cook, now U.S. Pat. No. 3,656,527.

DESCRIPTION OF PRIOR ART In the U.S. patent to Nicol] et al U.S. Pat. No. 2,187,326, .Ian. 16, 1940, cored pineapple cylinders (not contour peeled fruit) are pushed through a guide chute against a vertical fixed blade which completely severs the cylinders. The cylinders are separated by spreader plates 20 and laid severed faces up on parallel upwardly running trough conveyors for further processing.

In the U.S. Pat. No. 2,259,332, to Winkelman Oct. 14, 1941, peaches are rotated by rubber covered fruit turning wheels flanked by a complimental curved chute which wheels flank a rotating splitting knife which severs the peaches and advances them over separating blades. The split peaches are advanced face down in parallel lanes by a conveyor.

The U.S. Pat. No. 3,196,197, to Frank July 27, 1965 discloses partially severing strips of frozen food from above and below and completely severing the strips with a fixed knife.

The U.S. Pat. No. 2,163,791, to Lang June 27, 1939 and Fry U.S. Pat. No. 2,956,501, Oct. 18, 1960, disclose completely severing pickles and potatoes, by pushing them over a fixed upwardly projecting knife.

The U.S. Pat. No. 2,690,837, to Shaw Dec. 28, 1954, discloses overlapping rotary blades for severing vegetables on a vibrating table.

SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION In accordance with present invention, pineapples are precored using known equipment such as a coring tube, leaving some of the core material in place for strengthening purposes; and are then contour peeled. After having removed the crowns and the butts of the fruit, the precored, peeled pineapples are transferred by means of their precore hole to a downwardly inclined cylinder guide assembly comprising a slide rod having a dependent slit guide flange for receiving the lower slit in the fruit. At the entry end of the guide flange is a slitting knife which slits the lower side of each pineapple. As the pineapples progress down the guide assembly a juice trough on the bottom of the guide flange for the slit catches the juice. The pineapples then pass beneath an upper, rotary slitting knife which completes the halving operation while assisting in their advance. The halves are then guided along progressively twisting chutes from a vertical plane at the upper slitter to a horizontal plane, which chutes gradually diverge to laterally separating condition at their delivery ends for delivery of the halves with their core holes down. The guide rods are somewhat smaller in diameter than the precore holes so that multi-lane operation can be provided by curving the guide assemblies as required. The material left around the precore holes not only prevents fruit breakage during transfer of the peeled fruit from the peeler to the slitting and conveying apparatus of the present invention but also strengthens the fruit for subsequent conveying and handling. Flaps at the second slitter assist in maintaining the fruit on their guide chutes as they are twisted from their vertical towards their horizontal orientation. The above construction maintains control of the fruit during slitting, catches the juice and prevents damage to the fruit during the slitting and transfer operations.

BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS FIG. 1 is a section of a pineapple showing certain major operations performed thereon.

FIG. 2 is a diagrammatic plan of a multi-lane peeling head system embodying the present invention.

FIG. 3 is a view taken along line 3-3 of FIG. 2.

FIG. 4 illustrates the apparatus for transferring ring peeled pineapples from the peeling heads to the slitting and conveying apparatus of the present invention.

FIG. 4A is an enlarged fragmentary section through the discharge structure taken along line 4A4A of FIG. 4.

FIGS. 5 10 are diagrammatical operational views of the transfer apparatus.

FIG. 5A is an enlarged perspective of the stripper plate.

FIG. 10A is an enlarged plan view of the butt cutting knife.

FIG. 11 is a somewhat enlarged side view of the splitting and conveying apparatus of the present invention.

FIG. 11A shows a rotary under slitter for a modified form.

FIGS. 12 17 are sections through the guide and slitting apparatus taken as indicated on FIG. 11.

GENERAL ARRANGEMENT OF THE SYSTEM A system embodying the slitting and conveying system 10 of the present invention is shown diagrammatically in FIG. 2. Each assembly 10 receives fruit from a peeling head H, there being four peeling heads in the system ultimately resulting in 8 lanes of halved fruit being discharged to processing conveyors.

The diagram of FIG. 1 shows the operation performed on the pineapples P before they are halved. First, they are precored to leave a tubular volume of core material c around the precore hole 1 l, which provides strength for mechanically handling the pineapples as well as for preventing breakage during slitting, conveying and further processing. Apparatusfor performing this step is well known and usually entails pushing the fruit (which may have its stem end trimmed off) over a coring tube. The second step is to cut off the crown, which is done before the third step, which is peeling, the latter being accomplished by the contour peeling heads H. The fourth step is removal of the butt which is accomplished in the present machine (FIG. 9).

Referring to FIG. 4, pineapples P are supplied to each peeling head H by a transfer turret 12 having four combined transfer and peel pins 14 that are successively loaded with pineapples. The details of the transfer turret 12 are not critical to the present invention and thisturret and the structure associated therewith is disclosed in the aforesaid copending application of Vadas, Ser. No. 54,528, filed July 15, 1970, now U.S. Pat. No. 3,656,527.

The details of the contour peeling heads H are likewise not critical to the present invention. Peeling heads that can be employed are disclosed in the Vadas U.S. Pat. No. 3,522,459, Jan. 5, 1971 for a damped rotary peeling head and in the U.S. Pat. No. 3,382,900, to de- Back May 14, 1968, for a contour peeler, both assigned to Castle & Cook. After the peel pins 14 (which have drive collars 14a) have been pushed from below to run the pineapples up through the peeling heads H, the contour peeled fruit (which will have had the crown removed before peeling and which will have been precored) is pushed with a light press fit onto a discharge pin 16 above the peeling head. By mechanism to be described presently, the discharge pin 16 first swings to make the butt cut and then swings into alignment with a core tube slide rod 18 forming part of the handling system of the present invention. A sliding discharge plate 17, slotted at 17a to clear the rod 18 (FIG. 11) now advances to push the fruit over the first (lower) slitting knife 19 (FIGS. 11 and 13), until the lower half of the fruit is completely slit by the time it reaches the position shown in dotted lines in FIG. 11. The slit fruit now slides down the slide rod 18 with the slit encompassing a thin, depending guide flange 22 which orients the partially slit fruit (see also FIG. 14). Juice from the slitting operation flows down a depending guide trough 24 from which the juice drains into a receptacle 26.

The fruit continues to slide down the slide rod 18 and the guide flange 22 (or the following fruit pushes it down) until an upper, rotary slitter 30 is reached. As the fruit passes beneath the slitter 30 it is completely severed into halves ph (see also FIG.

The fruit halves ph, the cut faces of which were initially vertical are now progressively twisted and brought into the horizontal plane by companion chutes 32, 32a each having a half guide rib 34, 34a (FIGS. 2

and 3). The fruit halves ph, cut face down, are delivered by the chutes 32, 32a to cross conveyors 36, 36a (FIG. 2) which in turn deposit them onto longitudinal conveyors 38, 38a for further processing, inspection, trimming, recording, slicing, chunking, or the like.

Transfer Apparatus Construction The transfer apparatus for receiving fruit from each peeling head H and deposited onto the slide rod 18 of the apparatus 10 of the invention is shown in FIGS. 4 and 4A. The feed turret 12 has sliding peel pins 14 each of which receives a fruit in one position and is pushed from below in another position to free the fruit up through the contour peeling head H, as is completely disclosed in the previously mentioned Vadas application, Ser. No. 54,528, now U.S. Pat. No. 3,656,527. The transfer apparatus removes contour peeled pineapples that have emerged from the peeling heads H and transfers them to the slide rods 18, as previously described.

The framework and interconnected drive trains for the various rotary parts of the transfer apparatus 20 are not shown in the interest of clarity, it being understood that the moving parts are synchronized, but the drive details of their mode of synchronization is not critical to the present invention. The discharge pin 16, as best seen in FIG. 4A, slides in a sleeve 40 having trunnions 42 that pivotally mount the sleeve on frame elements 44 (the frame elements 44 are omitted in FIG. 4 for clarity). The discharge pin 16 is initially raised (FIG. 5) and is then lowered to pick up a peeled fruit from its peeling head by means of the fruit precore hole 11 (FIG. 6) and can be swung for transfer of the fruit (FIGS. 9 and 10). In the embodiment shown, the mechanism for raising and lowering thedischarge pin 16 comprises a barrel cam 46 (FIG. 4) driven in synchronism with the other cams to be described, and in synchronism with the turret 12. The barrel cam 46 has a groove 47 that receives a cam follower roller 48 on a discharge pin operating lever 50 that is pivoted to the frame at 52. The other end of the lever 50 connects to a link 54, the lower end of the link being pivoted to the discharge pin 16 at 55 (FIG. 4A). Thus rotation of the barrel cam 46 raises and lowers the discharge pin 16 and the cam groove 47 is designed to perform this operation in synchronism with other parts of the machine.

In order to swing the discharge pin 16 about its trunnions 42, for cutting the butt end of the pineapple and for transfer to the apparatus 10 of the present invention, and in order to independently swing a stripper plate 76, a double barrel cam 60 is provided (FIG. 4).

In order to swing the discharge pin, a cam groove 62 receives a follower roller 64 on a pin rocking bell crank lever 66 pivoted to the frame at 68. The other end of the lever 66 is pivoted at 69 to a link 70 which is pivoted at 71 (FIG. 4A) to a finger 72 projecting up from the discharge pin sleeve 40. Thus, rotation of the barrel cam 60 oscillates the sleeve 40 and swings the discharge pin 16 back and forth about the trunnions 42, first bringing the fruit impaled on the pin 16 to a butt trimming knife 74 (see FIGS. 9 and 10A) and then partially retracting the discharge pin 16 to bring the trimmed pineapple back in alignment with the slide rod 18.

The stripper plate 76 (FIGS. 4 and 5A), is slotted at 77 to clear the peeling pin 14 and is provided to strip the pineapple from the peeling pin 14 at the end of the peeling operation and insure that the fruit will remain on the discharge pin 16 as the peeling pin 14 is retracted down through the peeling head H. The plate 76 is pivotally mounted so that it can be withdrawn from its stripping position above the peeling head (as shown in dotted lines in FIG. 4 and as shown in FIG. 5) to accommodate pushing of the pineapple up through and out of the head. This withdrawal motion of the stripper plate 76 is provided by mounting the plate 76 on an angled crank arm 78 which is pivoted on the trunnions 42 for the sleeve 40, previously described. The stripper plate crank arm 78 is oscillated by the second groove 80 in the barrel cam 60, which groove receives a cam follower roller 82 mounted on one end of a bell crank lever 84, the lever being pivoted to the frame at 86. The upper end of the lever 84 is pivoted at 85 to a link 88, which in turn is pivoted at 87 to the upper end of the angled crank arm 78.

The discharge plate 17, previously mentioned, slides back and forth to strip pineapples from the discharge pin 16 and force them over the first slitter l9. The discharge plate 17 is slotted at 17a to clear the discharge pin 16 (FIGS. 11 and 12) and is mounted on a carriage 90 (FIG. 4) which reciprocates on frame mounted slide rods 92 (frame mounting omitted). The discharge plate 17 is reciprocated by a disc cam 94 and has a groove 96 which receives a cam follower roller 98 of a bell crank lever 100 pivoted to the frame at 102. The free end of the bell crank level 100 is pivoted at 101 to a link 104 and the Other end of the link 104 is pivoted at 105 to the stripper plate carriage 90. Thus rotation of the cam 94, in synchronism with the other cams 40 and 60, causes reciprocation of the discharge plate 17 along the axis of the slide rod 18.

OPERATION OF THE TRANSFER DEVICE Critical stages in the operation of the transfer device are shown in the operational diagrams of FIGS. 5 10.

FIG. 5 shows the stripper plate 76 in its fully retracted position under control of the barrel cam 60 which position'is also shown in dotted lines in FIG. 4. The discharge pin 16 has been fully raised by the barrel cam 46. The transfer mechanism 12 has one of its peeling pins 14, with its collar 14a supporting and holding the butt end of the pineapple, pushing a fruit up through the peeling head H.

In FIG. 6 peeling of the individual fruit being followed has been completed and the peel pin 14 has completed pushing the pineapple through the peeling head H. The stripper plate 76 has been advanced by the cam 80 (FIG. 4) so that the slot 77 (FIG. 5A) surrounds the collar 14a on the peel pin 14, below the butt end of the peeled pineapple In FIG. 7 the peeling pin 14 is being retracted by the mechanism (not shown) of the transfer turret 12 and the discharge pin 16 is being lowered to follow the retracting peeling pin by means of the barrel cam 46 (FIG. 4). The stripper plate 76 is supporting the butt end of the pineapple and preventing the retracting peeling pin 14 from pulling the pineapple back through the peeling head H.

In FIG. 8 the peeling pin 14 has retracted sufficiently to clear the peeled pineapple and the discharge pin 16 has fully descended through the precore hole. Again, the stripper plate 76 is supporting the butt of the pineapple against friction between the discharge pin 16 and the core material of the precore hole 11.

In FIG. 9 the discharge pin 16 and the stripper plate 76 have been simultaneously pivoted by their respective cams 46, 60 (FIG. 4) until the stripper plate reaches the butt knife 74 whereupon motion of the stripper plate 76 in this direction stops momentarily. However, the discharge pin 16 continues its upward pivotal motion in response to the action of the cam'60 and the cam groove 62 (FIG. 4). This additional swinging motion of the discharge pin 16 brings the butt of the pineapple across the butt knife 74, thereby trimming off the butt.

In FIG. '10 the stripper plate 76 has been fully retracted and a new pineapple is being pushed up through the peeling head by the next peeling pin 14. However, the discharge pin 16 has swung partially back from its previous position at the butt knife 74 and now dwells in alignment with the slide rod 18, by action of the groove 62 in the barrel cam 60 (FIG. 4). During the dwell period of the discharge pin 16 in the position of FIG. 10, the discharge plate 17 is lowered by the cam 94 (FIG. 4) in a direction parallel to the aligned discharge pin 16 and the slide rod 18 to strip the pineapple from the discharge pin 16, and onto the free end of the slide rod 18 and to further force the fruit completely over the first slitter 19, this also being illustrated in dotted lines in FIG. 11. Upon completion of the first (lower) slitting operation, the cam 46 withdraws the discharge pin I6 and the cam 60 swings it back in alignment with the peeling pin 14, restoring the conditions shown in FIG. 5, ready for the next fruit from the peeling head H.

OPERATION OF THE SLI'ITING AND CONVEYING MECHANISM The operation of the slitting and conveying mechanism 10 is shown in FIGS. 11 17. The action of the discharge plate 17 in forcing the pineapple P across the first slitting knife 19 for subsequent sliding down the slide rod 18 has been previously described. The partially slit pineapples then slide down the rod 18 being guided by the depending slit guide flange 22, also previously described. Thus the lower slit maintains the orientation of the fruit and the pan 26 catches the juice.

As the partially slit pineapples continue down the slide rod 18 they reach the rotating slitter knife 30 which is mounted on a drive shaft 30a. The slitter knife 30 is rotating in a direction to assist in the further advance of the fruit by a motor M (FIG.,4). As shown in FIG. 1, the slide rod l8 has a smaller diameter than that of the precore hole 11 in the fruit, thereby accommodating any curvature of the slide rod and associated structure that is required in order to spread out the delivery paths of the fruit as shown in FIGS. 2 and 3.

The rotary slitting knife 30 completes the halving of the fruit and as the upper slicing operation is being performed, the upper slit rides over a guide plate 31 that backs up the slitting knife 30. The chutes 32 and 32a start diverging from their upper edges soon after the upper slit has been completed, as shown in FIG. 16. The chutes then separate and are gradually twisted towards the horizontal plane for discharge onto the discharge conveyors 36 and 36a. The section of FIG. 17 shows the twist substantially completed. During this process the fruit halves Ph are being guided by means of their precore holes 11 sliding along the half ribs 34, 34a on chutes 32, 32a.

In order to prevent the slit pineapple halves ph from falling off the chutes 32, 32a while they are substan tially vertically oriented, rubber flaps 35 flank the upper slitter 30 and the back up guide 31, as seen in FIGS. 11, 15 and 16.

The precored, peeled, trimmed and halved pineapple portions ph are deposited by the diverging chutes 34, 34a onto the belts 36, 36a, seen in FIG. 1, whereupon they are transferred into parallel trimming and processing belts 38, 38a, as previously mentioned.

The pineapple halves can be recored to remove the remainder of the core material at any suitable downstream location, by mechanism such as shown in the copending application of Vadas, Ser. No. 233,094, filed Mar. 9, 1972, assigned to Castle and Cook.

FIG. 11A shows a modified form of slitting knife 19a which can be substituted for the fixed lower slitting knife 19, shown in FIG. 11. The rotary slitting knife 19a is operated by a motor (not shown) and rotates in a direction to assist in advance of the fruit down the mech anism 1 0 of the present invention.

Thus it can be seen in accordance with the present invention contour peeled pineapples can be transferred from vertical peeling pins onto a downwardly inclined slide rod and are slit in two stages thereby maintaining orientation of the fruit during slitting as well as providing for catching of the juice. Control of the resulting fruit halves is maintained after the second slitting operation and the halves are delivered cut faces down to the conveyors for processing. By handling the fruit in its precored condition, fruit breakage is minimized.

Although the best mode contemplated for carrying out the present invention has been herein shown and described, it will be apparent that modification and variation may be made without departing from what is regarded to be the subject matter of the invention.

I claim:

1. Apparatus for presenting pineapple halves for further processing of the type wherein peeled and cored pineapples are guided and vertically slit into halves and the halves are separated and individually directed to separate conveyors; the improvement comprising a first slitter for vertically slitting the lower portion of each pineapple up to the core hole without severing the upper portion, guide assembly comprising a core hole slide rod having a depending slit guide flange for receiving the partially slit pineapple, a second slitter for slitting the upper portion of the guided pineapple to divide the latter into halves, a guide chute for each half extending from said second slitter, said chutes being progressively twisted from a vertical plane at the second slitter to a horizontal plane, said chutes gradually diverging from coincidence at the second slitter to a laterally separated condition at their delivery ends for delivering the halves with their core holes down, and horizontal plane conveyors for receiving the halves from said chutes.

2. The apparatus of claim 1, wherein a core hole guide rib is provided on each chute.

3. The apparatus of claim 1, wherein said first slitter is disposed below a core hole guide rod that forms an extension of said guide assembly slide rod.

4. The apparatus of claim 1, wherein said guide assembly is downwardly inclined in the direction of pine apple travel.

5. The apparatus of claim 1, wherein said second slitter is a rotating disc knife turning in a direction to urge the pineapples along their path.

6. The apparatus of claim 3, wherein said first slitter is a fixed knife below said core hole guide rod and aligned with said slit guide flange.

7. The apparatus of claim 3, wherein said first slitter is a rotary disc knife turning in a direction to urge the pineapples along their path.

8. The apparatus of claim 1, wherein said core hole slide rod has a smaller diameter than the diameter of the pineapple core holes to accommodate slight curvature of said rod. 

1. Apparatus for presenting pineapple halves for further processing of the type wherein peeled and cored pineapples are guided and vertically slit into halves and the halves are separated and individually directed to separate conveyors; the improvement comprising a first slitter for vertically slitting the lower portion of each pineapple up to the core hole without severing the upper portion, guide assembly comprising a core hole slide rod having a depending slit guide flange for receiving the partially slit pineapple, a second slitter for slitting the upper portion of the guided pineapple to divide the latter into halves, a guide chute for each half extending from said second slitter, said chutes being progressively twisted from a vertical plane at the second slitter to a horizontal plane, said chutes gradually diverging from coincidence at the second slitter to a laterally separated condition at their delivery ends for delivering the halves with their core holes down, and horizontal plane conveyors for receiving the halves from said chutes.
 2. The apparatus of claim 1, wherein a core hole guide rib is provided on each chute.
 3. The apparatus of claim 1, wherein said first slitter is disposed below a core hole guide rod that forms an extension of said guide assembly slide rod.
 4. The apparatus of claim 1, wherein said guide assembly is downwardly inclined in the direction of pineapple travel.
 5. The apparatus of claim 1, Wherein said second slitter is a rotating disc knife turning in a direction to urge the pineapples along their path.
 6. The apparatus of claim 3, wherein said first slitter is a fixed knife below said core hole guide rod and aligned with said slit guide flange.
 7. The apparatus of claim 3, wherein said first slitter is a rotary disc knife turning in a direction to urge the pineapples along their path.
 8. The apparatus of claim 1, wherein said core hole slide rod has a smaller diameter than the diameter of the pineapple core holes to accommodate slight curvature of said rod. 